Last week was just a little too ridiculous.

High on the public radar were myriad accounts of scandal, shock and sensationalism in the news, and we couldn’t get enough of it. Stories bordering on absurd demanded our attention and stole the limelight from new developments in climate studies, foreign relations and federal and state law, but no one seemed to notice.

Locally, the revealing of Mayor Gavin Newsom’s affair, alcohol abuse and subsequent entrance to rehab titillated San Franciscans and probably sold a lot of newspapers. While the blogosphere hummed with gossip about our popular city leader caught stepping out of line, other civic happenings became less interesting. People remained foggy about the technicalities of the city’s new sick leave law and healthcare plan, but every detail about the mayor’s philandering and drinking was common knowledge.

The Newsom scandal lingered like a cold in the headlines until, much to his gratitude, NASA astronaut Lisa Marie Nowak donned adult diapers and drove 900 miles across the country in a car loaded with questionable items, allegedly on a homicidal mission. Those facts alone were enough to make us look up, but when we learned that her murderous pursuit was fueled by insane jealousy over her colleagues’ relationship, the story became tawdry enough for a celebrity tabloid.

Like some sort of perverse soap opera, this story was the ultimate tale of a love triangle gone wrong of astronomical proportions. The bizarre saga managed to grip us for a few days before the iconic Anna Nicole Smith died. The passing of the larger-than-life, gold-digging former Playmate turned reality television star seized the public’s attention and allowed our conversations to shamelessly center on Us Weekly-worthy topics. And for once, we weren’t embarrassed about it. After all, it was major news, right?

All of these stories, and our apparent hunger for them, said a lot about us. What do we deem important news? San Francisco was abuzz with the mayor’s sex life while bomb scares were reported throughout the city. Major newspapers across the country devoted most of their front page to Nowak’s arrest at the same time Republicans blocked Senate debate over the troop surge in Iraq. What was to be the first major congressional challenge to President Bush’s war plan apparently wasn’t as juicy as attempted murder by a psychologically disturbed astronaut. And the famous-for-being-famous Smith graced the covers and front pages of more news outlets than did the supreme leader of Iran, who on the same day as her death announced intentions to attack the United States if provoked.

Apparently, we prefer diversions to useful knowledge. We favor topics that make “Entertainment Tonight” producers crazy to those that prompt “World News Tonight” to issue breaking news alerts. We can see that most media outlets are more than happy to disseminate these gossip-worthy tales over stories that prompt us to seek out more information and get involved, because serious and sobering news is simply harder to sell.

If you aren’t worried about the waning interest of serious world issues, you aren’t paying attention. How many things could slip by our awareness if we are too caught up in the latest scandal? Issues that bring us back to reality are what should dominate our public dialogue. Since it is obvious the line between entertainment and news is blurred to obscurity, it is up to us to know the difference.